


Russian roulette is not the same without a gun

by falloutboiruto, ReaperDuckling



Category: Community (TV)
Genre: Comedy, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Romantic Comedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-19
Updated: 2019-08-19
Packaged: 2020-09-07 16:49:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20312803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falloutboiruto/pseuds/falloutboiruto, https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReaperDuckling/pseuds/ReaperDuckling
Summary: “Hey, do you want to fake date to mess with Pierce?” Abed asked casually one evening as he and Troy were sitting on the couch in their living room, watching a movie together. Judging from the way Troy choked on his popcorn, this was not a very commonplace causal proposal.“Why?” Troy asked."To mess with Pierce. I just said that," Abed said. "It would give me a great opportunity to try out some popular fanfiction tropes."





	Russian roulette is not the same without a gun

**Author's Note:**

> Title from "Pokerface" by Lady Gaga.

“Hey, do you want to fake date to mess with Pierce?” Abed asked casually one evening as he and Troy were sitting on the couch in their living room, watching a movie together.

Judging from the way Troy choked on his popcorn, this was not a very commonplace causal proposal.

“Why?” Troy asked.

"To mess with Pierce. I just said that," Abed said. "It would give me a great opportunity to try out some popular fanfiction tropes."

“But what about my very delicate emotio-I mean, sounds _hilarious_! Let’s do it!” said Troy as they shook hands on it.

-*-

“What’s up, gay-Os?” Pierce said offhandedly as he walked into the study room, took one look at Troy and Abed holding hands, and then turned around and walked out as fast as he could.

“That went about as well as I expected,” Abed said. “Maybe he’ll have a redemption arc later on. I sure hope so!”

"Doesn't gay-Os sound like a kind of cereal to you? It really should be," Troy said, eyes filled with wonder and amazement.

“I love how your mind works, and rightfully so as we are dating,” Abed said very convincingly and nuzzled Troy’s face with his other hand(a glint of what looked like pure panic entered Troy’s eyes at this, but he cleverly hid it by just shutting them closed. Ah, brilliant, a classic Troy maneuver).

“Ugh, you’re even more insufferable _now_ than before,” Jeff said vaguely nauseously.

"Well, I think it's great that they finally accepted their true vibrational selves," Britta said. "I am also a member of the LGBT community. As in, I'm bi. Solidarity, am I right guys?"

This was extremely sweet of her, and Abed felt almost a little bit bad for deceiving her about the true nature of his ‘dating' relationship with Troy. But then he remembered that one time she had eaten his buttered noodles and didn't feel as bad anymore.

“I’m also all for it. God loves everyone,” Shirley said like she was trying very hard to convince herself of just that and would eventually succeed and show a lot of growth as a person.

Annie just kind of nodded perkily and started doodling something in her notebook.

-*-

“Hello and welcome to Sexy Starbucks. What are you having?” Abed asked.

Troy just blinked at him. Several times. Probably in extreme confusion. Hm.

“Do you work in the cafeteria now?” Troy finally asked. They really were in the Greendale cafeteria, and Abed really was working there. But Troy had it all wrong, so Abed pointed to the sign he had put up.

“No, I work at the brand new installment here called Sexy Starbucks. It says so on the sign.”

A pause.

“So, this is the coffee shop alternate universe idea I was talking about,” Abed said. “Would you prefer a flower shop?”

Troy didn’t answer, so Abed dramatically grabbed a rose from under the desk that he had prepared just in case and put it in his mouth, stem snug between his teeth.

“Feeling seduced?” he said very unclearly as it was hard to speak properly with the thorns in his gums.

"What?" Troy giggled while antsily scanning the surrounding cafeteria as if looking for a potential threat.

“I said-_Pfft_,” Abed sputtered, removing the rose from his mouth and instead held it out in his hand towards his best friend-turned-fake-boyfriend. “Are you feeling seduced?”

"Uh, I don't know, I'm feeling _really _confused and kind of horn-I mean, _extra confused_ right now... I mean, _absolutely_! Definitely” Troy assured him while flexing his arms at the last part, probably to make it more convincing.

"Uh, anyway, can I have a Caesar Salad?" Troy continued "I don't drink coffee or eat roses."

Abed obliged.

-*-

“AbED,” Troy squeaked, trying and failing not to let his voice come out sounding like one of those internet rubber ducks. “what happened to the bunk bed?”

They were standing in their shared bedroom/blanket fort, where their usual bed had been replaced sometime during the day by a very cramped king-sized one. It was kind of sticking out a little, through one of the blanket-walls. 

“Oh. The bed? I had a favor to cash in with Pavel, so we switched.” 

“Why?!” 

“Well, in the words of Pavel himself: he gets mad sleepy, bro.”  
“Oh... No! I mean… why did you switch the beds?!” 

“Oh. Sorry, I thought it was obvious. We’re doing the ‘there was only one bed’-trope tonight.” Abed said, spreading his hands out in that way that made Troy think about magicians or circus directors or how handsome Abed’s hands were. 

Focus, Troy, _focus! _

“Nghk”, he said. 

“Let me explain. The ‘there was only one bed’-trope is usually characterized by two characters who, through some comedic or unfortunate mishap, find themselves sharing a bed when they weren’t originally prepared to do so. Fanfiction of this type usually details intercommunicate misunderstandings, romantic tension and, occasionally, smut.” 

“SmUT?” 

“Sexual intercourse.” 

“Mhm. Mhm, mhm, mhm…” Troy was trying his very best not to freak out. 

The thing is that he actually _did _know about smut. And the ‘there was only one bed’-trope, for that matter. It was only a week ago that he’d spent a restless night in his bunk bed, reading a saucy Spock x Kirk fanfiction on his phone, where there had been… a lot of thinking and feelings and accidental touching that turned not-so-accidental, and suddenly Troy couldn’t seem to stop staring at Abed’s hands. They were always so soft in his… 

"Of course, we don't have to do any of that," Abed reassured as if he could look into Troy's brain or something. "We're just sleeping together. Non-sexually. In the same piece of furniture. It's not that different from the bunk bed, really, we're just horizontal from one another instead of vertical."  
“For science?” 

“To mess with Pierce.” 

“Oh, yeah. To mess with Pierce.” Troy wasn’t sure how this would mess with Pierce exactly, it’s not like he was there to watch them sleep (or so he really, _really _hoped), but he trusted that Abed knew, he was smart like that, much smarter than Troy. 

They shared a quick smile and their signature handshake before getting ready for bed. 

Once Troy had brushed his teeth, changed into his favorite spiderman-pajamas, said goodnight to Annie and checked all of the hide and seek places for Pierce twice, just in case, he climbed into the bed as far away from Abed as possible.

He was feeling stiff, and restless and uncomfortable, and he had a nagging suspicion that Abed felt something close to the same. He was just… laying there, like a plank, a mummy or a (sexy) vampire, staring up at the roof. 

“Hey, Abed?” 

“Yeah?” 

"I…" he wasn't sure what he was going to say. "Goodnight."

“Goodnight.” 

Troy reached out and turned off the bedside lamp. 

Darkness fell over them and he found himself drifting into a restless, sweaty sleep. He dreamed of the Enterprise, that turned into Sexy Starbucks, that turned into a flower shop run by a tall, dark vampire with soft hands and gentle eyes and… was that a baby? They didn’t even _do _that trope, though Troy suppose that they could always borrow one of those fake baby dolls from sex-ed class, and what would raising a baby with Abed even be like? What would living with him like this be like, as a couple, sharing a bed and holding hands whenever they liked, hugging and touching and maybe even kissing?

What would kissing Abed be like? 

Troy woke up at three in the morning with that thought echoing through his head. Sometime during the night, he’d snuggled up closer to him. 

Abed still slept on his back, but he looked a lot more relaxed now than he had before. He’d nuzzled into his pillow so his head was inclined slightly towards Troy, their faces inches apart. His long lashes cast dark shadows down his cheeks and Troy had the sudden urge to brush some stray hair out of his face. 

Instead, he snuck out of bed. 

He collected his pillow and a blanket, then tiptoed out into the living room where he situated himself on the couch. 

This was getting way too complicated.

-*-

The next day in the study room, the group had a surprise laying in wait for Abed and his fake boyfriend.

“I am a Christian woman, that means that I love and accept all of God’s creation,” Shirley said sweetly. “So I baked you a cake.”

Said delicious-looking cake spelled ‘_Congrats on being Gay_’ on top in rainbow-colored frosting.

“Thank you, that means a lot,” Abed said, and looked over to Troy who just looked very, very sweaty.

“Ajdjdkj-I mean, also thank you,” Troy finally stuttered out.

Pierce now got up in front of them but also stood as close to the cake as possible.

“I also have something to say,” Pierce began. “The reason as to why I ran out the other day was to do to you as I have prepared to do to Britta and Jeffrey once they finally emerge out of their respective closets: recite a speech! I just had to write it first. So! As I am a proud, reformed Neo-Buddist, and my plentiful Energon Cubes harvested by super-bees at Buddha’s meteor crater make me very wise and able to see ultraviolet colors otherwise invisible to humankind, I can also see that being gay... is _ok_.”

Jeff slow clapped sarcastically from the back.

“That’s great, can we eat the cake now?”

“No!” Britta said. “Let them have their moment!”

"We're all very proud of you boys," Shirley said, with a sort of wet waver to her voice that wasn't there before.

“And happy for you!” Annie chimed in. 

"Yes, yes, this is all really romantic and all, but we have class in like fifteen minutes, so we need to eat this cak-"  
“To Abed and Troy!” Pierce interrupted Jeff, all while raising his glass of lemonade. “May they live gayly ever after!” 

“To Abed and Tro-” the rest echoed, but were interrupted by a loud:  
“hhhggnnnnnnNNNNNNOO! NO, NO, _NO_! Abed! I can’t-” Troy was crying. He looked at Abed, that suddenly felt kind of guilty. “I can’t do this anymore.” 

He ran out of the room, followed by a concerned flock of girls. Before exiting, Britta shot Abed with a suspicious glare that he answered with a slow blink and some squirming in his seat. 

Jeff was staring at him too. 

Pierce just helped himself to some cake. 

“Abed,” Jeff said, in a very flat tone. Abed squirmed some more. “what did you do?” 

“I…” the words wouldn’t come out. He swallowed around them. “I might have gone too far with this one.” 

“No shit. Look, Abed, I might not have been the most… supportive, in the group, in regards to your new relationship, but I want you to know that that has nothing to do with you and everything to do with the fact that I don’t believe in relationships, or _love_ just in general. It is, however, clear to me and anyone else that’s bothering to look, that Troy? Is crazy about you,” 

Something light and dizzy and bright flickered in Abed’s chest. Something that might have felt dangerously much like hope, if he’d had the guts to introspect it. 

"So whatever it is that you did to make him this upset, you better make it right again. If not for him, then for the peace of the group. It's enough work being the glue that holds you people together without having to play relationship counselor as well."

Abed straightened up. 

Grabbed a hold of that feeling, the light and dizzy and bright one, permitted himself to really _feel _it

(it’s love, he thought. 

Love and hope and quite a lot of guilt, because the situation got twisted and Troy got hurt, and that was never his intention), 

Before he turned to Jeff and gave him a nod. 

“Okay,” he said, “I’ll fix this.”  
“Attaboy.”  
“Go get your boyfriend back!” Pierce cheered only slightly unintelligibly through a mouth full of cake. They really should have given him some more credit when they first started this. 

“I will. Thank you.” 

-*-

“Troy? Are you in there?” 

“hNGk,” came the unmistakable sound of Troy. He’d locked himself up in the men’s bathroom stall, which had only deterred the women of the group so far (Abed found them earlier, on their way back to the study room. Apparently they’d followed him inside at first, but since he wouldn’t talk to them anyway, they’d decided to give him some space). 

Abed slumped against the wall and looked himself in the mirror. 

He’d put them in such a mess. 

“Troy, I’m sorry,” 

“you don’t…” 

“no, Troy. Let me finish. I’m apologizing because I lied to you.” 

“You… you lied to me? But…” 

"But friends don't lie. I know, that's why I'm apologizing. But to be completely fair, I think that I've been lying to myself about it too. You see, I didn't ask you to fake date me to mess with Pierce…"

“...you didn’t?” "No. I asked you to fake date me because I want to real date you. And I thought that, maybe, this way… you'd realize that you want to real date me too."

A long, heavy silence stretched out between them. 

Abed usually didn’t mind lapses in conversation, especially not when it’s with Troy, but this one felt different, uncomfortable and loaded. 

“So, uhm, anyway. What I’m trying to say is… I should have just… talked to you, but I was scared, so I deceived you into dating me, and now you’re hurt, and that was never my intention, and I don’t know how to fix this?” he was rambling, he knew, and it wasn’t like him but he didn’t know how to stop. “I’m going to need your help to fix this, if you’ll still have me, as your friend that is, I’ll do whatever you want. I should have known better than to think that you’d- that we would…” 

The door opened behind him and suddenly Troy was there next to him, wet-eyed but smiling. He took Abed's hands in his and that's nothing new, they'd done it a thousand times before, so why did it feel so different? It felt like a Beginning with a capital B.

“I’m going to need you to shut up for a minute.” 

Abed closed his mouth. He hadn’t even realised that it was still open. 

“Look, Abed… it sucked that you lied to me, even if you lied to yourself about it, too. But what sucked even more is the fact that you thought that you needed too? Like… I’m _obviously _crazy about you!” 

Abed clenched his hands a little tighter, making Troy smile even brighter. 

“So can we just agree that… well, if friends don’t lie to each other, then neither should boyfriends. Alright?” 

He nodded. Then, because he felt on the verge of bursting with words, he whispered:  
“Can I talk now?” 

“Yes.” 

“This isn’t how I imagined it at all.” 

Troy snorted a laugh. 

“What? Then how did you imagine it?”  
“Well,” Abed looked around. “not in the bathroom, to begin with.” 

Just as he said it, Leonard flushed his toilet and came out of one of the booths. He walked past them to wash his hands.

“Hey, Leonard.”  
“Nadir. Barnes.” 

Abed turned back to Troy, that was still smiling. 

“Also I thought that… well I thought that I’d be more of a driving force in this. Like, I’d take more of an initiative… I should have known better. You’re so smart.”  
“No! You’re the smart one!”

"I have my strengths, but your emotional intelligence has always trumped mine."

“No, but you’re like… smart-smart, with the whole-... and the… and I don’t even know, my brain is crying from happiness right now, so-” 

“UUUUUGH”, Leonard groaned, before throwing his paper towel in the trash bin. “just kiss already, will you?!” 

He left the bathroom. 

Suddenly, Troy seemed flustered. 

He looked down at their feet, and Abed felt himself straighten out a bit. 

Maybe he’d get to show some initiative in this, after all… 

“So uhm… what would you think if… we kissed? In the bathroom and we were both…” Troy looked back up at him. “what if we kissed and we were both guys?” 

"Well, …we _are _both guys… and I really would like to… kiss. So I think that I'd think that I'd… be fine with that. No, not just fine, I think that I'd really… really like that."

“Cool. Cool, cool, cool.” 

And so, they did. 

As far as first kisses go, it might not have been the best (being in the school bathroom and all), but Abed figured that that was okay, because they’d have lots of opportunities to kiss more, in more suitable kissing-locations, in the future. 

-*-

They came back to the study room hand in hand. 

“Hey, everyone. Sorry for the dramatic exit earlier.” Abed said. 

“Yeah, sorry for worrying you guys.” Troy chimed in. “We just thought that we should tell you that we’re actually dating now. Like… for real this time.” 

“Ooh, that’s nice!” Shirley chirped while clapping her hands.

"It truly is. Love is such a beautiful thing," Britta said. "I wish I was more comfortable bi-ing open about being bi. Perhaps I will now!"

A moment of silence passed.

“That was an outrageously corny pun,” Jeff said.

“Yeah, I know right?” Britta said while firing finger guns all over the room. Abed answered her with a finger gun of his own.

“Cool, cool cool,” he smiled.

And so the study group sat down together, ate their gay cake, and became thirty minutes late to all of their respective classes. 

The End

**Author's Note:**

> Please leave kudos and comments and tell us what you think of this! :3


End file.
